Evolved GK stars near the sun. I - The old disk populationA sample of nearly two thousand GK giants with intermediate band, (R,I),DDO and Geneva photometry has been assembled. Astrometric data is alsoavailable for most of the stars. The some 800 members of the old diskpopulation in the sample yield accurate luminosities (from two sources),reddening values and chemical abundances from calibrations of thephotometric parameters. Less than one percent of the objects arepeculiar in the sense that the flux distribution is abnormal. Thepeculiarity is signaled by strong CH (and Ba II) and weak CH. The CH+stars are all spectroscopic binaries, probably with white dwarfcompanions, whereas the CH- stars are not. A broad absorption band,centered near 3500 A, is found in the CH+ stars whereas the CH- objectshave a broad emission feature in the same region. The intensity of theseabsorptions and emissions are independent of the intensity of abnormalspectral features. Ten percent of the old disk sample have a heavyelement abundance from one and a half to three times the solar value.The distribution of the heavy element abundances is nearly a normal onewith a peak near solar abundance and ranges three times to one sixthsolar. The distribution of the (U, V) velocities is independent of theheavy element abundance and does not appear to be random. Ten percent ofthe old disk stars show a CN anomaly, equally divided between CN strongand CN weak. Several stars of individual astrometric or astrophysicalimportance are isolated.

A microwave survey of southern red giantsThe Parkes 64-m telescope has been used to survey a complete sample ofnearby red giants. The sample consisted of all 82 stars within 30 pc inthe Bright Star Catalogue having spectral types G, K, M and luminosityclasses I, II, III and occurring south of the celestial equator.Twenty-four stars, consisting of 19 G or K giants, two G or K brightgiants (luminosity class II) and three of the five M-type giants weredetected in the sample. The emitted 8.4-GHz power and surface fluxdistributions of the 24 detections have medians two orders of magnitudelower than those of the active radio emitters in close binaries andother rapidly rotating single stars. It is shown that the field redgiants with their low rotation velocities probably fit into thesurface-flux/rotation-velocity relation derived for the faster rotators.

The distance and structure of the Coalsack. I - Photometric dataThe results of UBV and H-beta photometry for 284 stars of spectral typesB to F located in the area of the dark cloud Coalsack are presented.Most of the present stars are brighter than 10.0 mag and are classifiedin the MK system of Houk and Cowley (1975). For each star, the bestvalues for the extinction and distance modulus are provided, withtypical estimated errors of + or - 0.08 mag for the extinction and + or- 0.32 mag for the distance modulus. Possible misclassifications andspectral peculiarities are noted for several of the stars.

A photometric survey of the bright southern Be starsRepeated UBV photometric measurements were made of the 86 bright Bestars south of declination -20 deg, and a network of comparison starswas set up. From a statistical study of the differential photometry itwas found that short- or intermediate-term variability seems to beoccurring in about half of the Be stars, and to be more evident in thestars of earlier spectral type. It was also possible to identify 11individual short- or intermediate-term variables. Four of these (all ofearly B spectral type) appear to exhibit significant variability on atime-scale of a day or less. More intensive observations of one of thesestars, 28 Omega CMA, indicate short-term variations consistent with thepublished spectroscopic period of 1.37 day.